Damn Liberal Media!
I mean really, here we are reading our paper and then we get to the opinions section and there's just op-ed piece after op-ed piece by some whining, knee-jerk liberal talking about ... oh wait, you mean there isn't?
Yes, despite the cries from the psycho right about that whole liberal media bias, apparently conservatives hold a nice large majority of the opinion pages. Media Matters took a look at the syndicated columnists in American papers. And guess what.
The results show that in paper after paper, state after state, and region after region, conservative syndicated columnists get more space than their progressive counterparts. As Editor & Publisher paraphrased one syndicate executive noting, "U.S. dailies run more conservative than liberal columns, but some are willing to consider liberal voices."
Read the survey for yourself at Media Matters because it's not just in loud annoying AM radio hosts where the conservatives dominate, it's on our editorial pages as well. Among their findings:
Sixty percent of the nation's daily newspapers print more conservative syndicated columnists every week than progressive syndicated columnists. Only 20 percent run more progressives than conservatives, while the remaining 20 percent are evenly balanced.
In a given week, nationally syndicated progressive columnists are published in newspapers with a combined total circulation of 125 million. Conservative columnists, on the other hand, are published in newspapers with a combined total circulation of more than 152 million.
Yes, despite the cries from the psycho right about that whole liberal media bias, apparently conservatives hold a nice large majority of the opinion pages. Media Matters took a look at the syndicated columnists in American papers. And guess what.
The results show that in paper after paper, state after state, and region after region, conservative syndicated columnists get more space than their progressive counterparts. As Editor & Publisher paraphrased one syndicate executive noting, "U.S. dailies run more conservative than liberal columns, but some are willing to consider liberal voices."
Read the survey for yourself at Media Matters because it's not just in loud annoying AM radio hosts where the conservatives dominate, it's on our editorial pages as well. Among their findings:
Sixty percent of the nation's daily newspapers print more conservative syndicated columnists every week than progressive syndicated columnists. Only 20 percent run more progressives than conservatives, while the remaining 20 percent are evenly balanced.
In a given week, nationally syndicated progressive columnists are published in newspapers with a combined total circulation of 125 million. Conservative columnists, on the other hand, are published in newspapers with a combined total circulation of more than 152 million.
posted by Anonymous at 3:44 PM
4 Comments:
Nice try, but what they're measuring is subjective. Appendix 3, Columnist Profiles, 'fesses up to this straight up-front. It's a problem that can be mitigated, but never eradicated.
And when they use the word "progressive" instead of "liberal" you know how that subjectivity is working.
Case in point: My newspaper is the Sacramento Bee. They run George Will alongside three other columnists, sometimes four, all of whom tilt left. So for me it's a case of "who'm I gonna believe, Media Matters or my lyin' eyes..."
Sacramento aside, maybe, i don't know how you could call the national media "liberal" or "progressive." the right has all the major tv talk shows--rush limbaugh, sean hannity, michael savage, lars larson, et al--arguably the most-watched cable channel in Fox, and then the Wall Street Journal, the bible of business, and several daily newspapers. my own hometown newspaper runs cal thomas and michelle malkin on a regular basis, with occasional david brooks sightings and maureen dowd maybe once a month.
hard to see that these complaints have any validity.
I agree that it is subjective as to what is progressive and what is conservative. Using the standards of 40 years ago, the media matters evaluation would say the press is skewed far more to the right than they do now. At the same time, to supporters of the likes of Fred Thompson, any position too far left for Hitler to support is what they consider progressive. They would call Eisenhower a flaming liberal.
Love the goofy graphic for your freebird friend up top. The dark masked imagery avatar speaks more volumes than his tunnel-visioned words ever could.
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